To Catch a Predator

by Bill Hayes

In To Catch a Predator, Newsweek profiles Kym Worthy, a prosecutor in Detroit, who is determined to clear the backlog of 11,000 rape kits in her jurisdiction.

Part of the reason for the clog is the price of testing the kits. Each kit can cost an average of $1,200 to $1,500, as technicians need to extract and separate DNA from two people — the victim and the assailant — from a swab, says Tofte, who writes about the issue in the new Human Rights Watch book, The Unfinished Revolution. But resources aren’t always to blame, she says; often the kits are simply a low priority for police. [more]